Author: Standards-Not-Tiers
High Court Action One Step Closer in Schools Reorganisation Battle
Tuesday, 9th September, 2008 at 9:55 pm, Isle of Wight
Press release issued By Standards Not Tiers on behalf of St Helen’s, Yarmouth and Chale Primary Schools SOS Action Groups
On Monday 8th September delegates from St Helen’s, Chale and Yarmouth Primary Schools held a meeting in St Helens, which was attended by Representatives of NASS, (National Association for Small Schools) and SNT (Standards-Not-Tiers).
Left to right: Sarah Edmunds, Chris Welsford, Miranda Botha, Mervyn Benford, Chris Farnsworth, Alison Bacon, Patrick Joyce, Lisa Dyer, Owen Toms, Caroline Diamond, Jonathan Bacon.
Speakers discussed the Isle of Wight Council proposals for the reorganisation and closure of schools, which are amongst the smallest and most successful in the country and agreed to offer assistance to all Island schools that are threatened with closure, both primary and middle.
Mervyn Benford of the NASS explained to group the duties and responsibilities of the Local Authority to present balanced and accurate information. Mr Benford, who has most recently been instrumental in helping to reverse the mass school closure proposals in Hereford and Worcester, Cumbria and Shropshire, outlined the basis for a legal challenge to the Isle of Wight Council’s plans to close 23 of the Isle of Wight’s 61 schools.
Caroline Diamond from St Helens SOS said:
“We have learned from Mervyn that there is a statutory duty to provide adequate and sufficient information to enable intelligent consideration and response, in other words to present both sides of the argument. I think we all feel that IW Council has failed in its duty to do that”
The group were shown evidence to support the argument that small schools produce some of the best results in the United Kingdom.
Mr Benford said that claims made by Steve Beynon at the St Helens’ consultation meeting that “small schools are more vulnerable to variable performance” were not supported by any published evidence.
In fact all the evidence points to the great success of small schools all over the world. He went on to tell the group that Council’s
“must provide evidence for their claims. It is simply not good enough for them to make unsubstantiated statements in public which they later have to refute in private or cannot support with evidence. The Government guidelines are very clear the local authority must not use language which could be misinterpreted and they must provide adequate time sufficient information to enable respondents to give informed responses ”.
Mr Benford presented a weight of evidence to support the retention of small schools as effective community based learning centres. The group learned that the 2005 “State of the Countryside” report to parliament by the Commission for Rural Communities studied schools test data and reported that “the best primary school results came from schools with under 100 on their rolls” and that closures and amalgamations compromise the identity and autonomy of local communities.
Very relevant to the Isle of Wight was evidence from The Scottish Executive in August 2006, following deep analysis of both performance and socio economic factors, that “the smaller the school the better were the outcomes”.
They discovered the children from the smallest schools had a “25% better chance of reaching university”. They also found that “children from impoverished, disadvantaged families made progress where their counterparts educated in larger schools remained an often expensive cadre of under achieving disaffected pupils”.
Ofsted Inspections and results from St Helens, Chale and Yarmouth and many other small primary and middle schools, lend support to these findings and the group resolved to do all they can to fight the Isle of Wight council and prevent the closure of these schools.
Chris Welsford, Chairman for SNT, said:
“It is wonderful to have the full support of the NASS. They have years of experience in fighting local authority plans to close small schools. They have the evidence we need, to show that the Council has got this wrong.
We are now able to prepare a solid legal case to challenge the council in the courts where they refuse to provide the evidence to back up their claims, particularly in respect of small scale education and the impact that closures will have on communities.
The Council have consistently argued that small schools are ineffective when the truth is completely the reverse and we can prove it. One way or the other, we will stop the council from closing schools on the Isle of Wight, whether it be through the courts or through the ballot box”
Chale, Education, St Helens, Yarmouth
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September 9th, 2008 at 11:32 pm
How can SNT compare school closures in places like Cumbria and Shropshire with the Island? A school closure in either of these counties would probably mean an extra 10-20 mile journey to the next school.
The closure of the over subsidised Chale Primary would mean a journey of just 2 miles (or just over the hill)to Niton Primary. Why should a Chale parent expect to receive 2 to 3 times the expenditure on their child compared to a parent in a Ventnor school?
Maybe closing the smaller primary schools will free up financial resources that could be better spent in the rest of the school system. While at the same time making the remaining rural primary schools more sustainable.
September 10th, 2008 at 12:16 am
its simple…give them both the same amount of money and let the parents make up the difference if they want to keep the school open
September 10th, 2008 at 9:00 pm
Earl Grey,
1. We were not comparing the Isle of Wight with Shropshire or Cumbria - as you would know if you read the item with a little more care.
2. The idea that closing small schools like Chale would free up resources for other schools is misleading and demonstrates a lack of knowledge on your part - probably understandably, as it seems like a logical argument. We calculated that if Chale were closed and the spend per child redistributed to each child attending a primary school on the Isle of Wight the result would be an extra £15 per child per annum not taking transport costs into account. This is academic and completely misleading.
Funding for revenue is calculated on a needs basis and small schools like Chale receive additional funding which is lost when they cease to exist.
There is extensive research that shows that transport and social costs far outweigh any cost savings. An academic study in France of 50 schools, 22 of which had closed under rationalisation, revealed that by 1999 the overall transport costs to the surviving 28 had almost overtaken the additional cost of keeping the fifty open and as fifty they had achieved better results. By 2008 the cost in the UK of bussing pupils to alternative schools, using firm commercial calculations, demands £1000 to £1500 per pupil per year per five mile journey, and rising rapidly (source: NASS).
Standards at Chale are judged by Ofsted as Very Good, putting Chale into the top 5 primary schools on the Island. If standards are what matters then we should be prepared to pay for it, rather than engaging in envy arguments. Interestingly, the outstanding primary schools, Binstead, Northwood and Gurnard all achieve their excellent results with less funding than Chale which should indicate that it is not the funding per child that makes the difference. It is inspirational leadership and teaching and also high levels of parental involvement and engagement that are proven to be the most significant factors in producing results.
Interestingly of our 46 primary schools only the three mentioned above were judged outstanding, Chale was judged very good and Gurnard received a very effective (on the old Ofsted scale). 26 were judged good and the rest, 15 were satisfactory. They all get different funding levels and there is no correlation between those levels and the standards.
Of the schools proposed for closure (and not reopening or being replaced) 14 of them or 58% (against the total proposed for closure) are judged to be good or better. That is an outrage and cannot be justified!